Markdown help

collapse | the above section is quoted for convenience from the full editing help, below.

Code and Preformatted Text

Indent four spaces to create an escaped <pre> <code> block:

printf("%d\n", 42); /* what was the
question again? */

The text will be wrapped in tags, and displayed in a monospaced font. The first
four spaces will be stripped off, but all other whitespace will be preserved.

Markdown and HTML are ignored within a code block:

<blink>
You would hate this if it weren't
wrapped in a code block.
</blink>

Code Spans

Use backticks to create an inline <code> span:

The `$` character is just a shortcut for `window.jQuery`.

(The backtick key is in the upper left corner of most keyboards.)

Like code blocks, code spans will be displayed in a monospaced font. Markdown and
HTML will not work within them. Note that, unlike code blocks, code spans
require you to manually escape any HTML within!

If your code itself contains backticks, you may have to use multiple backticks as delimiters:

The name ``Tuple`2`` is a valid .NET type name.

Linebreaks

End a line with two spaces to add a <br/> linebreak:

How do I love thee?
Let me count the ways

Italics and Bold

*This is italicized*, and so is _this_.
**This is bold**, and so is __this__.
Use ***italics and bold together*** if you ___have to___.

Links

Basic Links

There are three ways to write links. Each is easier to read than the last:

Here's an inline link to [Google](http://www.google.com/).
Here's a reference-style link to [Google][1].
Here's a very readable link to [Yahoo!][yahoo].
[1]: http://www.google.com/
[yahoo]: http://www.yahoo.com/

The link definitions can appear anywhere in the document -- before or after the
place where you use them. The link definition names [1] and [yahoo]
can be any unique string, and are case-insensitive; [yahoo] is the
same as [YAHOO].

Advanced Links

Links can have a title attribute, which will show up on hover. Title attributes
can also be added; they are helpful if the link itself is not descriptive enough
to tell users where they're going.

Advanced lists: Nesting

1.Lists in a list item:
-Indented four spaces.
*indented eight spaces.
-Four spaces again.
2.Multiple paragraphs in a list items:
It's best to indent the paragraphs four spaces
You can get away with three, but it can get
confusing when you nest other things.
Stick to four.
We indented the first line an extra space to align
it with these paragraphs. In real use, we might do
that to the entire list so that all items line up.
This paragraph is still part of the list item, but it looks messy to humans. So it's a good idea to wrap your nested paragraphs manually, as we did with the first two.
3.Blockquotes in a list item:
> Skip a line and
> indent the >'s four spaces.
4.Preformatted text in a list item:
Skip a line and indent eight spaces.
That's four spaces for the list
and four to trigger the code block.

Simple blockquotes

Add a > to the beginning of any line to create a blockquote.

> The syntax is based on the way email programs
> usually do quotations. You don't need to hard-wrap
> the paragraphs in your blockquotes, but it looks much nicer if you do. Depends how lazy you feel.

Advanced blockquotes: Nesting

To put other Markdown blocks in a blockquote, just add a > followed by a space.

To put other Markdown blocks in a blockquote, just add a > followed by a space:

> The > on the blank lines is optional.
> Include it or don't; Markdown doesn't care.
>> But your plain text looks better to
> humans if you include the extra `>`
> between paragraphs.

Blockquotes within a blockquote:

> A standard blockquote is indented
>> A nested blockquote is indented more
>>>> You can nest to any depth.

Lists in a blockquote:

>- A list in a blockquote
>- With a &gt; and space in front of it
>* A sublist

Preformatted text in a blockquote:

>Indent five spaces total. The first
>one is part of the blockquote designator.

Images

Images are exactly like links, but they have an exclamation point in front of them:

![Valid XHTML](http://w3.org/Icons/valid-xhtml10).

The word in square brackets is the alt text, which gets displayed if the browser
can't show the image. Be sure to include meaningful alt text for screen-reading
software.

Just like links, images work with reference syntax and titles:

This page is ![valid XHTML][checkmark].
[checkmark]: http://w3.org/Icons/valid-xhtml10
"What are you smiling at?"

Note: Markdown does not currently support the shortest reference syntax for images:

Here's a broken ![checkmark].

But you can use a slightly more verbose version of implicit reference names:

This ![checkmark][] works.

The reference name is also used as the alt text.

You can also use standard HTML image syntax, which allows you to scale the width
and height of the image.

[meta] – link to the current site's Meta; link text is the site name (e.g. "Super User Meta"). Does nothing if the site doesn't have (or already is) a Meta site.

[main] – like [meta], just the other way around.

[edit] – link to the edit page for the post the comment is on, i.e. /posts/{id}/edit. Link text is "edit" (capitalization is respected).

[tag:tagname] and [meta-tag:tagname] – link to the given tag's page. Link text is the name of the tag.meta-tag only works on meta sites.

[help], [help/on-topic], [help/dont-ask], [help/behavior] and [meta-help] – link to frequently visited pages of the help center. Link text is "help center" (capitalization is respected). All links point to the main site.

[about], [meta-about] – link to the About page. Link text is "about" (capitalization is respected). meta-about only works on meta sites.

[so], [pt.so], [su], [sf], [metase], [a51], [se] – link to the given site. Link text is the site name.

[chat] – link to the current site's chat site, the link text being "{site name} Chat".

[something.se] – link to something.stackexchange.com, if that site exists. Link text is the site name. Use [ubuntu.se] for Ask Ubuntu.

Replying in comments

The owner of the post you're commenting on will always be notified of your comment. If you are replying to someone else who has previously commented on the same post,
mention their username: @peter and @PeterSmith will both notify a previous commenter named “Peter Smith”.

It is generally sufficient to mention only the first name of the user whose comment you are replying to, e.g. @ben or @marc. However you may need to be
more specific if three people named Ben replied in earlier comments, by adding the first character of the last name, e.g. @benm or @benc
Spaces are not valid in comment reply names, so don't use @peter smith, always enter it as @peters or @petersmith.

If the user you're replying to has no natural first name and last name, simply enter enough characters of the name to make it clear who you are responding to.
Three is the minimum, so if you're replying to Fantastico, enter @fan, @fant, or @fantastic.

You can use the same method to notify any editor of the post, or – if this is the case – to the
♦ moderator who closed the question.